The fate of the activist: a fighter with Putin fled to Europe and hated her

27.12.2017

Tags: Russia, Opposition, Politics, Europe, West

A new wave of emigration has risen in Russia. Only for a year from the country 20 left opposition. Most rely on Western values, but not everyone can accept the rules and laws of the new country. A political emigrant often turns out to be a loner, rejected both in his homeland and in the shelter - and on the directly opposite motives. The BBC tells the story of an ordinary activist who fled Russia from criminal prosecution for insulting Vladimir Putin, but found himself in the Dutch court for libel and homophobia.

"I have already been given five or six criminal cases, I do not remember exactly" - you might think that 31-year-old oppositionist Ruslan Lebusov talks about problems with the law in Russia, but in fact he describes his lawsuit in the Netherlands.

In January, the court of The Hague will decide whether the political emigrant Lebusov is guilty of libel, violation of bans on visiting the campus, personal persecution and slander against the teachers of the University of Leiden. He himself now regrets that he supported Pussy Riot and believed in Western democracy.

Why did the Russian oppositionist from the outback, having received political asylum in Europe, turned into a conservative anti-Western?

"I was not afraid of anything, then many people were euphoric"

Lebusov was born and raised in Kostroma, received a diploma from a law institute, but he never officially worked, having opened a store for household goods with his brother.

"I wanted to become a policeman when I went to law school, but then I set myself the goal of never working for any state institution, and never paid taxes - I have such a position, a stiff denial of this filthy state," he says.

Until 2011, Lebusov was, as he calls himself, a "button oppositionist" - he signed petitions on the Internet. At the rally, for the first time it turned out to be 10 December 2011, when the largest events were held in the cities of Russia against falsifications in the elections.

"When I went out into the street, I realized what a swallow of freedom was all about, now I wanted to change, I went to school when [Putin] came to power, I soon get 32, and he's all sitting and sitting," he says. .

Kostroma journalists who covered the protests, recall Lebusov as the most radical of their party, "with excessively sharp judgments, in forged shoes and a leather jacket with chains." On the day of Vladimir Putin's inauguration on 7 May 2012, he assembled a rally on the central square of Kostroma. He made a speech in which he used the words "insignificant crook" and "thief."

Lebusov was detained, his speech was sent to a linguistic examination and a criminal case was opened on 319 article for insulting Vladimir Putin as a representative of the government during the performance of his official duties.

Lebusov is one of several citizens of Russia, who was prosecuted solely for insulting the honor and dignity of President Putin. And the only one who, according to the materials of the case, did it not virtually.

"When I moved out of the apartment - my mother came to me, they said - let her remove her page from VKontakte, annoy her," he recalls. At the user's desk at Lebusov's, Putin is in rags, a cap and a noose around his neck. In the albums almost 5000 photos, most of which are politically incorrect political memes. "On my page 282 (article of the Criminal Code of Russia on extremism - the BBC), you can even start every day," - he admits.

"I was warned that there would be problems, but I was especially not afraid of anything, then many people were euphoric," Lebusov said. Filling out the application for the next meeting, he wrote that he was waiting for Kostroma all the Moscow opposition, headed by Boris Nemtsov, Sergei Udaltsov and Alexei Navalny. He told 1000 prospective participants and asked for parking on 300 machines. In the police Kostroma did not understand the joke, they blocked the bridge with a truck and stopped the traffic.

Lebusov stood in solitary pickets, threw stones at the office of "United Russia", glued stickers "Freedom Pussy Riot" to the administration and the main temple of the city. "Now I would not, and then I had associates from LGBT, I was a liberal to the core," he recalls.

They threw novocaine in a mailbox - Lebusov understood this as a hint, they say, an anesthetic will be needed. He noticed the shadowing. He was summoned to the conversation by the deputy governor: "He said that there will not be any more actions on the main square, but there will be only buffoons and other entertainment events there."

Then Leybusov was beaten on the street by three strangers: "I realized that we should bring down." The opposition does not support the opposition from the center, they have their own business. "The criminal case is hanging.

"They sit day and night with hashish, what they are political"

In autumn 2012 Lebusov got on the plane - for the first time in his life, but immediately without a return ticket.

The Netherlands he chose because there were already living oppositionists who fled from Russia, whom he heard on the news: Alexander Dolmatov from the NBP (banned in Russia) and Denis Solopov from the anti-fascist movement.

Lebusov left the plane in Amsterdam and asked the guards where they "surrender to refugees." The officers of the migration service had a day off, and the next day Lebusov spent in the company of vagabonds who had been living at the airport for several years without documents and registration. They knew where to have free coffee, where to wash, where to sleep, hiding from the guards.

Worked as guides for inexperienced tourists, treating them with cigarettes, booze and marijuana. Started - Russian - suggested Lebusov stay with them, but he went to turn into an official political emigrant. The process took him almost two years.

About the refugee camps, the memories remained unflattering: sheds in the forest, a toilet for ten, conflicts with the administration.

"There are a lot of people from Iraq, only those who really did political affairs are few." There they are: sitting in a room with round cannabis, they are political, tree-sticks. Somalis are simply horror. in the cones from Eritrea, on which the worms had not just crawled, and did not even know the language, I asked them to resettle, they cleaned it, but fined me on 50 euro as a racist, "he says. In the Netherlands migration service, the BBC clarified that "all the procedures enshrined in the law are observed in the camps, and complaints are recorded by employees."

Three months after the arrival of Lebusov in the deportation center of Rotterdam, the national Dolmatov committed suicide, to which the Dutch authorities refused to take refuge. "From that moment my views began to change: they are independent here, people do not need brains," Kostromich believes.

Lebusov was also twice tried to refuse refugee status, the reason was called the most common - the impossibility of verifying the authenticity of the documents submitted (information on the initiation of criminal proceedings, medical evidence of beatings and others). But he reached the Supreme Court of the Netherlands and won the migration service.

"I got a very good lawyer, even though I watered the Dutch by that time," Lebusov said.

"It was hard, all around the Dutch"

In April 2014, Kostroma got official refuge, an unlimited residence permit and an apartment in Amsterdam. By that time, he had learned Dutch for a free program for migrants with higher education and entered the preparatory courses at the Free University of Amsterdam.

"Well, it's like our 11 class, the classes there are funny, of course, some migrants are sitting, some people do not know who won the Second World War," Lebusov recalls.

He enrolled in law school: English and Dutch passed himself, and wrote mathematics in Iran with the words: "Help me, sister, I *** do not understand this."

To pay for studies, took a loan, moonlighting translations and legal advice for Russians. He spent only half a year ("here he is sitting on 1100-10 years") at the 15 euro and started receiving a scholarship in 900 euro.

"I had enough for living, I went to Italy, Belgium, Germany." It was normal, "he says. I began to go to the Free University, but something "was hard, boring, all around the Dutch."

Familiar with the affairs of Russia, they paid little attention to: "In general, I went here to do business, I planned to fight the regime from here, according to a tough scenario." To calculate where apartments and houses belong to [Putin's friends] and expropriate the property. it does not agree, Europe corrupts people, of course. "

In September 2016 Lebusov transferred to the University of Leiden for a program of Russian studies. Among the teachers is the translator Larissa Anisimova, she learned the Russian language, Yorrit Faassen, whom the western and Russian media called Putin's son-in-law.

Lebusov was inspired: "I thought, that's what I need, I will become an expert, I will start working, but I immediately began to notice that Russian-speaking people are studying there and are leaving." Lebusov decided that there was "Russophobia" at the faculty, then it seemed to him that the specialists there needed "only a certain format." Putin's criticism, on the other hand, was considered too soft: "For example, in the lesson" Introduction to Politics and the Economy of Russia "they say: [Ramzan] Kadyrov, yes, the dictator, of course, but saved Chechnya and raised the region from its knees."

Lebusov, not hesitating in his expressions, criticized faculty teachers on his Facebook page. Specialist for Russia and the CIS Max Bader called the Russophobe for an article stating that the celebration of the International Women's Day in Russia emphasizes that women do not have rights there. Professor Egbert Fortuin - a pedophile advocate for the text about the movement of the neo-Nazi Maxim Marcinkiewicz "Occupation-pedophile", whose members, according to the author, "humiliated and raped gays."

"But if you look at the videos of the" Occupation-pedophile ", then it's clear that everyone was caught on the bait, the boys are 12-14 years old, there are no gay adults there, - Lebusov is indignant." "As far as the Nazi Marcinkevich is concerned, the fact remains. pedophilia. "The professor lied."

Teachers refused to talk about Lebusov. "It's too sensitive," they told the BBC. The press service of the University of Leiden did not comment on the claims of the former student, referring to the inability to disclose personal information.

"Increasingly I want to buy a gun"

In March 2017 Lebusov caught a cold. He did not go to the doctor, he took paracetamol and forgot about the indisposition, when he suddenly fainted.

"And it all began: all the following months of pain in the muscles, liver, loss of consciousness, nausea, impotence, arrhythmia." Since June 20, a crisis came, I had attacks - I lay cold, could not move, then started shaking like epileptics, I the ambulance from the last forces caused, "- recalls Lebusov.

At first, the doctors could not find the cause of the ailment. Lebusov himself at random bought antibiotics in the pharmacy, smeared with a solution of vinegar, soared in the bath. He made dozens of tests, but not on Lyme disease - an infectious disease transmitted by tick bite, affecting the musculoskeletal and nervous system.

In July, it turned out that Lebusov had carried her on his feet. In the midst of the disease, he began to complain about the inaction of the doctor who treated him, the "inhospitable" Dutch who poisoned him, and the Russian special services - that they sent him a spy with poison.

All this he emotionally described in his Facebook. Difficulty with recovery was explained by the lack of proper treatment. When it turned out that the doctor is gay, his homophobia has reached a critical size. Cited a link to a newspaper article about the adoption of a child from the United States by a doctor and his partner.

During the illness he was expelled from the university - he did not show up for the exams. Then 5 September 2017 Lebusov stood at the entrance to the main building with a poster "Stop Russophobes and defenders of pedophiles": "I spoiled the first-year student's day." All the students only discussed what had happened. "

Teachers called the police, Lebusov spent five hours in the monkey. There he learned that the university administration had forbidden him to be in all areas of the university, you can not contact the teachers and write anything about them in Facebook.

In addition, it turned out that two professors and a doctor wrote to him statements to the police about insults, slander and threats to life. In a criminal case, the materials of which are in the BBC's editorial office, the prosecutor cites Lebusov's posts from his Facebook, where he reflects on how to take revenge on his doctor's "five months unhealed" - "immediately or tormented" him?

There are also phrases like "Increasingly I want to buy a gun and shoot these fascists."

"I took a bite on the so-called liberal values"

In the morning of October 17 seven people arrived on the road to Lebusov's house in Amsterdam on three cars. In flak jackets and with arms in hand. They knocked the door to the former student's apartment, twisted it and, in handcuffs, led him out into the street.

"I was lying in the monkey and thought that I was at the cinema," recalls an oppositionist familiar with the Kostroma isolators. The court arrested him for two weeks with the phrase "there are fears that the suspect will commit a crime for which they punish for up to ten years."

"I told them that they do so only in North Korea, and my lawyer replied that after such words they will leave me for another month in the detention center," he recalls. But after 14 days the judge released Lebusov, without even taking a written undertaking not to leave the place.

Now Lebusov does not study, does not work, waits for the trial. He admits that "because of the illness he was not embarrassed in the expressions, he insulted, but did not slander": "I really think so." After I was not treated by a gay doctor and thrown out of the gay teacher's school, I hate gays. once even advocated for their rights. "

"Now I can not write anything in Facebook, otherwise I will be closed again." I'm hooked with them specifically. "I do not deny that, but I can not stay away from health, and so I would go to the very end. , Lyme was not treated from the second one, [Lyme disease] was not treated, I will not be given a passport with my criminal background, especially since I have encroached on such things as homosexual rights and other so-called liberal values, I myself adhered to them, but after all these events I Other values ​​have become values: conservative, nationalistic, anti-Western. At home this Putin is sitting, hunting to live in a normal country, "says Lebusov.

Return to Russia Lebusov not with his hands. In 2015, the criminal police of Kostroma and the FSB operatives began checking information that Lebusov from Holland, with the help of acquaintances, wanted to organize the seizure of the summer residence of Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev in Plyos.

"They called me, they say, we are from the police, we check the statement, about the terrorist attack on Plyos, which your son was preparing, and I tell them - what kind of terrorist attack, are you, Ples, where is it at all?" - told the BBC's mother activist Svetlana Lebusova.

To question the preparation for the seizure of the country of the second person, the state was also summoned by the owner of the local sports club, where he was engaged in Lebusov. In the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the administration of the FSB of the Kostroma region, official inquiries of the BBC at the time of publication could not be answered.

"Well, I realized that you can not go back at all," says Lebusov, "there's at least one camera for one, a microwave oven, there are books, a toilet and a shower." I'd better sit here. "

The court in his criminal case will begin in January. The lawyer believes that Lebusov will be imprisoned for six months.

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